Sorry For The Inconvenience

For several months now I've had a picture from the front page of one of our local newspapers posted on my fridge for inspiration.

It's of an Idle No More demonstration held in downtown Nanaimo on a cold day in January this year, attended by hundreds of people.

What inspires me about it is the look on the faces of the people - proud, defiant, resolute, and happy.

Central to the photo is a young woman with her son, holding a sign that says, "Sorry for The Inconvenience - We Are Trying To Change The World".

And to me, that says it all. It speaks to my values, and to those in our cohousing community of Pacific Gardens.

It is inconvenient living in cohousing sometimes, but that inconvenience changes you, and in doing so, changes the community, both here and in the larger world.

I've written here before about the rock-polisher effect of living in cohousing - how rubbing up against other people and their views wears down your sharp edges.

That can be uncomfortable, especially when it forces you to learn things about yourself that you didn't know before. But it makes you grow.

The biggest sharp-edged rock we keep bumping up against at Pacific Gardens is the difficulty of doing what's best for the common good.

We've all been brought up in a society that tells us we should have what we want when we want it, even if it's at the expense of the well-being of others.

So often conflicts arise because although we want to change the world, we don't want to change ourselves, because it's too inconvenient and uncomfortable.

And that's why I keep looking at that photo, so I'll be inspired to change my own world, even if it is inconvenient.

Kathryn

Rock-Polisher IV - How a Broken Hot Water Tank Changed My Life

I've been thinking again about the rock-polisher effect in cohousing, and how our lives can be changed by something totally ordinary.

A few weeks ago our three-year-old hot water tank fractured, flooding our recycle room and leaving us with only one tank for the entire building.

So the word went out that we should use hot water sparingly until it was replaced, which, since it was custom-made and had to be re-built, took several weeks.

This caused me a certain amount of anxiety.  I am a big fan of hot water - long, hot showers, bedding washed on the longest cycle, dishwasher on power scrub - yes!!

Sparingly and hot water were not words I would use together.  But, I experimented.  I rinsed the dishes in cold water, then put them through the dishwasher's quick cycle.  They were fine.

I did the same for the laundry - my clothes and bedding came out of washing-machine clean as clean, and it took me a lot less time, as did shorter showers.  This was good.

And when we had our new hot water tank at last, I didn't go back to my old ways.  This made me realize how many new lifestyle habits I have acquired since I moved here.

I don't just read my daily newspaper and then throw it into the recycle bin.  I deliver it to David, who, after he reads it, passes it on to Ron, who then gives it to Bill.

If I have left-overs, I give them to somebody else.  I lend my car out to anyone who needs it.  I'm willing to try unfamiliar foods at our potlucks - nettle soup, gluten-free bread.

I don't buy as many clothes, and I give more to thrift shops or put them in our freecycle cupboard.  I feel comfortable not wearing makeup, and what makeup I do wear is organic.

I don't buy as much stuff.  I considered getting a new car (my little Echo is 10 years old this summer) but didn't.  I've kept my old printer and computer - ditto with my seldom-used cellphone.

So how did this all happen?  It wasn't because someone gave me a lecture, or passed a bylaw.  It was all slow and incremental, little changes made by following the example of other people here.

And that's how the rock-polisher effect works, living in this Pacific Gardens river where we all tumble up against each other and smooth out our rough edges.

Kathryn

Rock-polisher Resolutions for the New Year

I always make New Year's resolutions, even if some of them I don't get around to until September or even later.

Perhaps this is due to my innate optimism, which keeps bubbling up inside me despite all the concrete evidence that I should be pessimistic about the state of the world and myself.

Someone who lives in cohousing, though is pretty much guaranteed to be an optimist and a person with a rather irrational but firm belief in self-improvement - another aspect of the rock-polisher effect.

So, here goes, my New Year's resolutions for myself and my life at Pacific Gardens.

1.  I will try to be more patient. (Last year, I did manage to achieve this with my relatives; the big test this year is whether I will be able to do this with my Pacific Gardens family.)

2.  I will do more of what makes me happy. ( Singing does this, and this year I am going to join a third choir, one that sings for people in hospices.)

3.  I will try not to interrupt and spend more time listening to what others say instead of thinking about what brilliant comments I can make as soon as that other person stops talking!

4.  I will try to relax more and visit with friends and family more often. (This is an annual resolution that I am getting better at, but not enough.)

5.  I will try to let go of and stop obsessing about what I cannot change. (Argggghhhh!)

6.  I will try to be more accepting of the changes to my body and my physical limitations as I age. (This is definitely difficult for someone who believes in self-improvement - sometimes slowing the decline is the best you can do!)

7.  I will spend more time outdoors and less time hunched over a computer. (Oh no...does that mean I have to give up Facebook?)

8.  I will get to bed earlier.  (So much to read, so little time!)

9.  I will learn how to do something new. (Could this be the year I try my hand at gardening?!)

10.  I will stop doing activities out of a sense of duty and start doing them out of a sense of joy.

These 10 are a good start for someone dedicated to self-improvement. And since it's still fairly early in the evening - at least for me - I may even fulfil resolution #8 tonight.

Not a bad beginning to 2013 for this rock-polisher!

Kathryn

The rock-polisher effect, part III

I've been taking some practice sessions in Nonviolent Communication with  residents of Pacific Gardens the last few weeks, another example of the rock-polisher effect of cohousing.

The goal of NVC, as it's known, is to make life wonderful for yourself and for others.  Yeah, right, you're saying - if I believe this is possible, I must believe pigs can fly.

And I have to admit, that was my attitude when I first heard people at Pacific Gardens discussing it. Nonviolent communications seemed just too airy-fairy, plus downright impossible to achieve.

After all, everybody wants to win, and hardly anyone ever concedes that their point-of-view isn't the absolutely correct one - or to be more honest, I hardly ever do.

But if so many of my Pacific Gardens friends felt this was valuable, and since the winner-takes all approach didn't always seem to work that well, maybe it was time for me to take a closer look.

I went to an introductory workshop, and was hooked.  I had to dig deep into myself to discover the core values and needs that were the bedrock of my connections with other people.

And this has led to all kinds of discoveries about myself, and the people I relate to in my everyday life. Instead of leaping into the fray, I am learning how to stop and think about what causes me to react.

Who knows? I may eventually acquire some patience if I keep at it. This barnacled old rock keeps getting polished here at Pacific Gardens!

Kathryn

The rock-polisher effect, part II

Earlier in this blog I talked about the rock-polisher effect of cohousing, and how it had helped me become a better person, by making me more patient.  Well, to be honest, saying it's made me more patient is somewhat of an exaggeration.  In fact, I think a truer representation would be to say it's made me a bit more patient, or even a teensy bit more patient.

You see, patience doesn't come easily to me.  First off, I've spent most of my life working in media, so deadlines are of critical importance to me.  Second, I am what you could call a hot reactor - in fact, my father  dubbed me "the atomic-powered mosquito" when I was a child.

I really do try to sit still and listen during our community meetings as we go through the consensus process, and I have been to communication workshops where once again, I am told the importance of listening.

But I don't know what happens - I hear something and before I know it, I am responding without the frontal lobes of my brain even realizing it.  And watching me try to sit still and listen when someone says something I disagree with is interesting. Our next-door neighbour, Ian Gartshore, who has witnessed this during Green Party meetings, says it's like seeing the human equivalent of a cell-phone on vibrate.

At least now I don't catapult myself out of my chair, and I have been known to wait at least a few minutes before I express my point of view rather energetically, and it takes only a few attempts by other people in the meeting to get me to stop interrupting.

Maybe when I'm older (I'm now of pensionable age) I'll master this.  In the meantime, this rock still needs some patient polishing.

Kathryn

(Here I am a meeting - the second from the right - being patient.)

The rock-polisher effect

Sometimes it's hard to explain to people why I chose to live in cohousing.  It isn't always easy; in fact, sometimes it's downright challenging. I guess the best answer I can give is that I like living here because it makes me a better person.

Diana Leafe Christian, cohousing guru and author, has described it as the rock-polisher effect. By tumbling up against each other as we struggle to live in community, we round off our sharp edges, become brighter, more beautiful.

For me, I've learned how to be more patient with myself and others, more accepting of differences. Understanding others takes time, and that's good. It's also given me the courage to live according to my beliefs, knowing that there are others who will join me along the way. And that is a great gift, worth all the challenges.

Kathryn